BENGALURU  SATURDAY  FEBRUARY 20, 2021  `7.00  PAGES 22  LATE CITY EDITION PHASE-1 OF DISENGAGEMENT AT PANGONG LAKE COMPLETE Senior military commanders will meet on the Chinese side of Chushul-Moldo Border for the 10th round of talks on Saturday OTHER FRICTION POINTS TO BE DISCUSSED CHINA FINALLY ADMITS GALWAN CASUALTY Both sides pulled back troops from the north and south banks of the lake in a four-step plan that comprised withdrawing armour, artillery and other heavy equipment, followed by infantry. During the Saturday’s meeting, other friction points, including Depsang, Hot Springs and Gogra, will be taken up. The process disengagement began on February 10 | P9 ■ ■ Admitting for the first time that it, too, had suffered casualties in last June’s conflict at Galwan, the China’s Central Military Commission honoured five soldiers, including four posthumously China’s figure is conservative. Russia recently put it at 45. India had lost 20 soldiers in the hand-to-hand fight at Galwan in 2020 48-hour DEADLINE SET TO CONVENE THE 10th ROUND AFTER DISENGAGEMENT CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOGGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ WARANGAL ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI DELHI HIGH COURT RAPS MEDIA SENSATIONALISM Says cover toolkit case based on verified sources; Disha custody extended that the petition was a systematic attempt to blame the police and derail the ON a day a local court placed investigation. activist Disha Ravi in threeHowever, the h igh court day judicial custody in con- stated: “Right to privacy, the nection with the toolkit case, sovereignty and integrity of the Delhi High Court on Fri- the country and the freedom day underlined her right to of speech need to be balanced. privacy and told media houses The recent coverage definitenot to sensationalise ly shows there is the coverage of the sensationalised reprobe. The high court porting by the mepassed the directions dia. While press on a plea filed by Disbriefings are held ha regarding leak of generally media can, probe details, and sennot disseminate the sational coverage by information in such media houses. a sensationalised Earlier, seeking manner.” Disha Ravi more time to interroUpholding the gate Disha, the Delhi Police journalistic ethics of not distold a court: “We have issued closing the source, the court, notices to several others to however, directed media housjoin the probe. We want to es to base their coverage on confront Disha and Shantanu. ve r i f i e d a n d a u t h e n t i c During the course of interro- sources. gation, Disha shifted the Disha had moved the high bl a m e o n t o N i k i t a a n d court seeking to restrain the Shantanu.” police from leaking to the meIn the high court, Addition- dia any probe material in relaal Solicitor General Suryapra- tion to the FIR lodged against kash V Raju strongly opposed her. The petition had also Disha’s petition, saying the sought to restrain the media activist was defaming and vil- from publishing the content ifying the police. He claimed of her private chats. EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ New Delhi FRIDAY FREEZE No, this is not Chicago or Texas in the US, or even Europe. Shanivarsanthe in Somwarper taluk of Kodagu district experienced a sudden hailstorm on Friday, covering the town and many villages in a blanket of white | EXPRESS | REPORT: P7 K’taka aims to have Jan Aushadi centres in all govt hospitals A S H W I N I M S R I PA D @ Bengaluru KARNATAKA may well become the first state in the country to have Jan Aushadi centres in all government hospitals. With the Union Government planning to start such centres in all government hospitals across the country, Karnataka is likely to take the lead in taking up the initiative to make medicines available at affordable prices to more people. Currently, under the Pradhan Mantri Bhartiya Janaushadhi Pariyojana (PMBJP), there are nearly 7,500 Jan Aushadi Kendras in the country, of which 850, accounting for over 10 per cent, are in Karnataka. The State Government is tar- Landmark UK verdict on Uber drivers as staff sparks hope A landmark verdict of the UK Supreme Court on Friday classifying ridehailing app Uber’s drivers as its employees and not selfemployed, was widely welcomed by drivers’ unions in India, hoping it would help build their case for changing the oppressive work conditions back home. It ruled that the driver would have full protection as an employee from the moment the app is switched on and not from when the ride commences. A similar demand for the regularisation of Uber and Ola drivers is pending before the Industrial Tribunal in Kerala’s Thrissur. T R S Kumar, president of the All Kerala Online Taxi Driver Union, said online taxi drivers are upbeat about the UK verdict. “We were first in India to file a similar case. We hope the UK Supreme Court verdict would be helpful in our case as well. It will surely be a lesson to employers to treat online taxi drivers as regular employees with pension and other welfare schemes,” he said. However, Tanveer Pasha, president of the Ola-Uber Drivers Association in Bengaluru, was not as upbeat. He said six months back a similar order was passed by California courts and the parliament there. CONTINUED ON: P7, SEE ALSO: P12 (Inputs from Bosky Khanna @ Bengaluru; Toby Antony @ Kochi; B Anbuselvan @ Chennai; Sudarsan Moharana @ Bhubaneswar) geting to have 1,000 centres by end of this year. On an average, 20 new Kendras are being opened in Karnataka every month. Bengaluru Urban district alone has 211 centres, followed by Dakshina Kannada with 76 centres. As on date, the state has recorded Rs 118 crore business from these centres for the year 2020-21. The government is hoping to touch Rs 125-130 crore turnover by the end of March 2021. The state will have main distribution centres at Bengaluru, Hubballi, one in Coastal Karnataka and also in Kalyana Karnataka. “Distribution of medicines to centres will be done from here,’’ said P7 the sources. FACEBOOK BATS FOR GLOBAL POLICY FRAMEWORK Facebook India MD Ajit Mohan said it will be helpful if India takes the leadership role in formulating standard regulations that tackle data privacy issues and other challenges | P13 Disha’s parents are distraught, says advocate B A L A C H A U H A N @ Bengaluru CLIMATE activist Disha Ravi’s parents were “extremely emotionally distraught” after a Delhi court remanded her to judicial custody for three days on Friday “Her parents thought that . on the completion of Disha’s five days in police custody she would be released , and she could return home. They are laypersons and don’t understand the difference between police and judicial custody Their anxiety has only height. ened after she was remanded to judicial custody,” said Disha’s family friend and advocate R Prasanna. Her arrest in the farmers’ protest toolkit case has sent shock waves and led to angry reactions from activists, students, human rights organisations among others. Prasanna said that he was expecting that the court would send Disha to judicial custody, given the “nature of the offence she has been charged with, the gravity of the situation and the hype that has been P7 created around it”. EXPRESS READ Man dies 10 days after vaccine dose Terrorists gun down two cops in Valley Bengaluru: A valveman of the waterworks department from Chikkaballapur died on Friday, a day after he was discharged from Jayadeva Hospital where he was treated for chest pain he had developed after receiving a vaccine shot on February 10. He was discharged on February 18, but died while being shifted again to the hospital, health officials said. P3 Srinagar: A day after visiting foreign diplomats departed, terrorists gunned down two policemen in the city on Friday. Their firing at two unarmed policemen was caught on camera near Baghat Chowk. Both of them later died at the police hospital. Inspector General of Police blamed the Lashkar for the attack. Meanwhile, three militants were shot dead while a policeman died in an encounter at Badigam in south Kashmir’s Shopian district on Thursday. P10